This looks like a good debate. Steinbrueck is a good choice as a moderator as he is informed and moderate.
My only concern is that Peter may not have the skills to control demagoguery or an overly partisan crowd. The sponsors could easily have gone to one of the media stations or even to the UW for someone with better moderator skills.
Already, on Facebook, supporters of rent control are directing traffic to Sawant’s side. This is sad because Sawant’s site is censored, no non-Sawant comments are allowed. Sawant regularly uses Facebook to pack meetings and her crowds drown out discussion.
The hard issues that I believe should ought to be discussed are these:
- are there examples of any US city where rent control has worked? The answer that no other city has done rent control right is unconvincing.
- how does rent control affect low income newbies? An impressive study from San Francisco shows that a huge part of the problem of rent for low income people is that low income workers are attracted to cities like ours with a large increase of well to do and middle class. These well off Seattlites create jobs and those jobs attract people who need housing.
- Is there any evidence of state wide support for rent control? Aside from any other issue, the rent problem is now. Since rent control is illegal in Washington state, any change needs to come from an initiative or from the legislature. These efforts are likely to take 4 or more years, given how often the legislature meets.
- What income classes would be affected by rent control? The image portrayed by the Sawant is compelling … this is an image of a homeless family driven out by some Daddy Warbucks. But, rent control typically is not limited to slum level housing. Would it also apply to middle class housing? If not, isn’t this an incentive to disinvest in low income housing?
- What incentive would there be to the landlord to maintain rent controlled housing rather than take her money and invest it elsewhere?
The sad thing is that these questions may never be answered. Already some seem to want to turn a useful discussion into yet another event for Sawant to “win” by filling the audience with her red shirted followers.